Responding to the continued rise in COVID19
clusters in migrant worker dormitories in Singapore, and building on earlier
research (See CARE White paper Issue 6), this White Paper reports on the
findings of a survey conducted with low-wage migrant workers in Singapore. In
addition to the poor living conditions highlighted earlier, the structural
constraints on preventive behavior are explored. Drawing on the key tenets of
the culture-centered approach, the research highlights the powerful role of
structural factors such as arrangements of dormitories, the absence of hygienic
conditions because of the structures, the lack of clean toilets, pressure on
limited toilets, and scarcity of water. The findings highlight the challenges
to mental health and wellbeing experienced by the workers. Moreover, it points
to the absence of voice infrastructures, and the ways in which this absence
contributes to conditions that are rife for the pandemic. Solutions for
structural solutions and voice democracy are offered.

In this white paper, the community advisory group in Highbury, working with community researcher Gayle Moana-Johnson, developed the key conceptual guidelines for culture-centered community-grounded testing. The white paper highlights the key concepts anchoring the partnership between the community advisory group and the clinical team at HHPNZ

This white paper outlines the key principles of culture-centered community-led testing that are voiced by the advisory group of community members in Highbury, anchored in the principle of representing the most “in-need” members of the community (referred in the rest of this white paper as the “margins of the margins”). The key ideas in this white paper are developed as anchoring principles for the partnership between the community advisory group and the Health Hub Project New Zealand (HHPNZ).

Courtesy Julio Etchart as part of CARE’s “Respect Migrant Rights” campaign in Singapore

The high incidence of COVID-19 cases in dormitories housing low-wage migrant workers in Singapore makes visible the structural challenges of poor housing and food. Building on CARE’s ongoing work with low-wage migrant workers in Singapore, this white paper presents imaginaries for healthy housing and food voiced by low-wage migrant workers.

The findings reported here are drawn from our advisory group of community members that represent the community in Highbury. The advisory group has been built on the basis of purposive sampling, ensuring that the voices of the “margins of the margins” are represented. The advisory group meets face-to-face as well as on a digital platform. The group is facilitated by two community researchers, recruited from within the advisory group and trained in the fundamentals of interview-based research.

Mohan J. Dutta, Director, Center for Culture-centered Approach to Research and Evaluation (CARE)

A wide range of models have been proposed as frameworks for responding to Covid-19. These models highlight the significance of healthcommunication in preventing the spread of COVID19 as well as in effectively responding to it. The positioning of specific models as solutions to COVID-19 is tied to the creation of actual strategies of responseglobally. One such model that has been rapidly disseminated in policy discourse and circulated in articulations of COVID response is the “Singapore Model.” Drawing on the key tenets of the CCA, this paper will examine the premise of the “Singapore Model” as a framework for global health.

The white paper draws on the key tenets of the CCA to examine Singapore’s pandemic response. The CCA foregrounds the interplays of culture, structure, and agency in the constructions of health meanings and the development of health solutions.

Structure refers to the political economy of organizing resources in society. Culture reflects the community norms, community-based meanings, and community values guiding relational negotiations of health and wellbeing. Agency reflects the relational and collective capacities of communities to develop solutions.

Mohan J. Dutta, Director, Center for Culture-centered Approach to Research and Evaluation (CARE)

The global nodes of spread of Covid-19 highlight the significance of health communication in preventing the spread as well as in effectively responding to it. On January 30, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. Noting the aggressive movement of the virus across countries, with eight countries reporting more than 1000 cases of COVID-19, the WHO declared COVID-19 as a pandemic. Drawing on critical analyses of the pandemic and crises response literatures as well as building on the experiences of CARE in developing culture-centered community grounded interventions,this white paper outlines the culture-centered approach to pandemic response, specifically directed at offering culturecentered guidelines for effective communication. The culture-centered approach foregrounds the interplays of culture, structure, and agency in the constructions of health meanings and the development of health solutions.

Dr Phoebe Elers, Dr Steve Elers and Professor Mohan Dutta

This study explores the challenges experienced by residents in Glen Innes, Auckland. The findings have assisted in the identification of local problems and corresponding solutions, including the ‘Poverty is Not Our Future’ campaign, which has served as anchor for residents to challenge dominant structures and, at the same time, communicate their everyday realities of poverty. While this study is focused on Glen Innes, material hardship continues to be a significant issue in Aotearoa New Zealand, with research determining that 13 percent of children lived in households that experienced material hardship in the 2017/18 financial year (Statistics New Zealand, 2019) and that children born into disadvantage in Aotearoa New Zealand have a significant likelihood of remaining disadvantaged (New Zealand Treasury, 2016a, 2016b; Templeton, 2016).

2019

Christine Elers & Prof. Mohan J. Dutta

The erasure of indigenous voice goes hand-in-hand with the occupation of indigenous land. What we witness over the past seven years at Ihumātao, as an extension of over a century of colonialism in Aotearoa, is the deployment of colonial tactics to erase and silence the voices of indigenous Māori peoples. Through a variety of tactics the controls over which are held by the colonizers, Māori voices resisting colonialism are silenced. The very uses of communicative strategies of indigenous participation are deployed in logics established by the colonizer to prop up and perpetuate the colonial-capitalist structure, with the state making claims to having created opportunities for participation. The capitalist interests, served through naturalized logics of the market, reflect the oppressive nature of colonialism, all the while working to erase through the very performance of tools of participation and engagement. In this backdrop, drawing from the ongoing protests at Ihumātao, in this white paper, we attend to the organizing role of indigenous voice as the basis for dismantling colonial capitalism. The Māori voice of resistance in Ihumātao, resounds with indigenous voices in Hawaii, who are protecting their sacred land – Mauna Kea from the construction and intrusion of a giant telescope on the summit. Elsewhere across the globe the plurivocality of resistance offer pathways for addressing the very challenges that have been brought on by the accelerated corporate-colonialism of neoliberal governmentality.

2018

Dr Murdoch Stephens & Professor Mohan J Dutta

The attached white paper – The state helps the refugee speak: dialogue, ventriloquism or something else? – on the funding of refugee voice organisations was prepared between November 2018 and April 2019. In the wake of the terrorist attacks on two Mosques in Christchurch on 15 March 2019 the need to address the issue of refugee support organisations becomes acute as they a significant role in the representation of many Muslim citizens in New Zealand. Specifically, the lack of funding for organisations that are tasked with connecting with refugee communities and representing those voices to government, media and the public undermined the ability of these organisations to respond after the attacks. We particularly note the absence of “democratic communication infrastructures” owned by refugees for representing their voices in New Zealand. (Stephens and J Dutta, 2019)

Dr. Sue Bradford & Prof. Mohan Dutta

In this advocacy brief, we examine the transformative capacity of collaboration between academics and activists offering a pivotal anchor for local-national-global resistance. In the white paper on academic-activist partnerships, Dr. Sue Bradford and Professor Mohan Dutta draw from their journeys in academia and activist organizing to examine the intersections, synergies, challenges to, and lessons for academic activist partnerships. Questioning the meaning of collaboration and the nature of collaborative spaces in social change, the authors offer a conceptual framework for collaboration that joins in solidarity with the struggles of the oppressed.

Prof. Mohan J. Dutta & Ms. Braema Mathi

In this advocacy brief, we examine the nature of sexual violence on university campuses, the effects of sexual violence, and the role of communication in preventing as well as responding to sexual violence. Based on our review of the literature, we offer strategies for communication advocacy directed at addressing sexual violence veon university campuses.